2025 IMPACT REPORT
THE CENTER WE HOLD
2025:
A crossroads for regional leadership
“As organizers, we are builders in the era of collapse. We have been building and continue to build worlds that are going against all odds. … We build new worlds because we understand that in these spaces is where we find our joy. We build new worlds because we find the inspiration for our art. We find our voices again sometimes, and this is where we will find ways to live and care for each other. We’re builders who build with care, we build with human connections and relationships. We build because we know we can only survive together, and together, we will fight for this world.”
Kim Wasserman,
MWEJN Leadership Team Chair & Co-Founder
Where is the center of the world? Some wisdom traditions in the Midwest understand it as the crossroads, a place of change and becoming. Others describe the center as any place we make sacred by caring for the connections between the people, the land, and our more-than-human relatives who share it.
In the work of environmental justice, these are the lines we draw.
In 2025, the Midwest Environmental Justice Network gathered in Mni Sota Makoce (Minnesota), the homeland of the Dakhóta Oyáte (Dakota People). We were just a few blocks from the sites of both Owámniyomni (St. Anthony Falls) and Wíta Wanáǧi (Spirit Island), important places in Dakota geography and cosmology. The Dakhóta Oyáte are the original stewards of the sacred land and waterways of Minneapolis. These sites — like many others — were desecrated in the colonial project of Minnesota. Yet partners like Owámniyomni Okhódayapi and Waḳaƞ Ṭípi Awaƞyaƞkapi have been doing transformative work rematriating these places along the Ȟaȟá Wakpá (Mississippi River) to Dakota communities today.
There’s a direct thread from colonial takeover to the occupation by ICE that Minnesota has suffered over the last several months. We saw federal policy claw back hard-won protections for clean air and water, for climate, and for the most vulnerable among us to feed themselves and recover from disasters. In their place, corporations and corrupt politicians unleashed ICE, DOGE, and data centers on our communities, believing they could dominate the Midwest on the world stage. Instead, our neighbors came together and took care of each other. In defending where we live, work, and pray, we taught the world that place is power — a force that ripples far beyond our communities.
In our commitment to place, this is the circle we form.
As a regional intermediary, the role of the Midwest Environmental Justice Network has long been to strengthen the ties that power successful, place-based, relationship-first movements. Movements led by Tribal, historically redlined, immigrant, and working class communities. In a year when these ties were sorely tested, we were able to move capital and capacity to more than 60 frontline organizations across 12 states. We hope you’re inspired by this report and can take away the same lesson we did from our grantee partners: Neighbors are the basic building blocks of power — the only power durable enough to build renewable energy systems, sovereign foodways, and a healthy democracy that can triumph over the polluters’ playbook.
At the Midwest Environmental Justice Network, this is the center we hold.
In Solidarity,
Shalini & Eartha, Co-Executive Directors of the Midwest Environmental Justice Network
How the Midwest moves environmental justice forward
Last year began with a deep retraction of federal funding and regulatory oversight across the agencies meant to protect us — protect our water, our land, our air, and our communities. As 2025 went on, so too did the attacks from the federal government on the most vulnerable in our society.
At the Midwest Environmental Justice Network, the year called us to remember what we have always known to be true: that our communities hold the solutions to the problems they are faced with, that relationships are the most powerful paths to sustain transformative change, and that we have weathered these storms before.
Both our funding and the work of our grantee partners follow in a long lineage of successful Midwest movements. Our ancestors understood that to mobilize people and place for collective power, we need to nurture our ability to relate, respond, reframe and reclaim.
WE RELATE
building movement and belonging
Relationships and reciprocity power every successful movement in the Midwest. We win when we see one another, when we share culture, and when we can strengthen what ties us together in our common struggles and solutions. From convening to mutual aid, the Midwest EJ Network and our grantee partners treat mutual care as critical infrastructure.
In November of 2025, more than 50 leaders gathered in Minneapolis from MWEJN’s partner organizations to remember what grounds and connects us in the work of environmental justice. Thread by thread, we linked our origin stories and watershed victories from one community to the next. What took shape was the map of a movement: united, undaunted, and never alone.
Photo Credit: Ujima STL Executive Director Nick Speed presents during the environmental justice story map exercise at the 2025 MWEJN Gathering.
WE RESPOND
funding resistance and resilience
When polluters move in next door, communities in the Midwest rise up to protect. When politicians break their promises, community organizations step in to provide. The Midwest EJ Network moves funding and expertise to these groups so that they can respond to local needs in a time of major upheaval.
In 2025, MWEJN’s Frontline Fund awarded 60 groups a total of $1.8 million in flexible, multi-year, general operating grants to stabilize their work across the Midwest. We mobilized an additional $239,700 in rapid-response support to help communities address urgent threats. Beyond direct funding, we built ongoing partnerships with researchers, attorneys, and communications experts to help groups strengthen their campaigns. By weaving local resistance into regionwide strategy, our partners grow smarter and stronger with every fight.
Photo Credit: COPAL and community members gather in support of immigrants and to protest ICE in Rochester, Minnesota.
WE REFRAME
shifting the narrative
Storytelling shapes what’s possible. Across the Midwest, communities are telling their own stories that frame up real solutions and unleash the alternative futures within reach. Working closely with our grantee partners, the Midwest EJ Network builds power to deploy their stories in more ways and in more places, disrupting narratives that mislead and divide.
In 2025, MWEJN entered the third year of our communications accelerator, providing over 65 hours of pro-bono, tailored communications support to our 60 grantee partners’ regional storytelling projects. In partnership with the Samara Collective, we delivered one-on-one support to partners who needed everything from logo redesigns to campaign platform support and youth media training. This added boost in communications capacity was designed to uplift partner stories and narratives, while easing the capacity strain on small-but-mighty grassroots orgs.
Photo Credit: Community members attend a public meeting with a sign from Just Transition Northwest Indiana’s Community Over Big Tech campaign.
WE RECLAIM
shaping new futures
Here in the Midwest, we turn abandoned lots into grocery stores, church roofs into solar arrays, and food pantries into voter registration centers. We know how to transform even the least of our resources into strongholds of community power. The Midwest EJ Network moves in that same spirit to activate new and creative sources of capital so that organizations can scale solutions that compound our well-being.
Last year marked our first year investing in local organizations through the Thriving Communities Grantmaking Program. This federally funded EPA initiative awarded $60 million to the Great Lakes region over three years. Together with the Minneapolis Foundation, RE-AMP, and NDN Collective, MWEJN successfully challenged federal attempts to roll back the program, and moved funding to projects that addressed a wide range of community needs — from healthy food access and affordable, clean energy, to emergency recovery and environmental health and safety.
Photo Credit: A Red Circle hosting the Juneteenth Volunteer Day at the Healthy Flavor Community Garden in 2025.
60
groups funded by MWEJN’s Frontline Fund across 12 states.
$2M+
in flexible, multi-year general operating grants, including $239K in rapid response support.
65+
hours of tailored, in-kind communications support for regional narrative work.
$60M
federally funded EPA program to the Great Lakes region over 3 years.
Our partners are guiding stars, not flyover states.
Tap a star to learn about our partners.
North Dakota Native Vote
NDNV empowers the state’s tribal communities to build a representative democracy through community organizing, education, and advocacy.
Dakota Wicohan
Dakota Wicohan works to revitalize the Minnesota Dakota language, known as the eastern or D-dialect.
Dakota Resource Council/Fort Berthold POWER
Fort Berthold POWER aims to conserve and protect the land, water, and air on which all life depends, particularly from the devastating effects of the Bakken oil boom.
Rosebud Energy Service Company (RESCo)
RESCo is a tribally owned entity of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe dedicated to advancing clean energy solutions, reducing grid problems, and creating sustainable opportunities for our people.
Great Plains Tribal Water Alliance
GPTWA aims to protect the sovereignty of the Great Plains Tribes through preservation of water rights for the people and future generations.
Cheyenne River Youth Project
The Cheyenne River Youth Project is dedicated to giving our Lakota youth and families access to the culturally relevant, enriching, and enduring opportunities we need to build stronger, healthier communities and a more vibrant future together.
Black Hills Clean Water Alliance
The Alliance aims to protect valuable resources – especially water – for future generations, by preventing destructive mining in the Black Hills.
Great Plains Action Society
GPAS is an Indigenous-led initiative to rematriate Indigenous ways of life throughout the Great Plains region. Through community engagement and grassroots initiatives they build Indigenous power through healing justice and a regenerative economy.
Rise4EJ
Rise4EJ aims to bring attention to the community-led solutions that are growing in resistance to chemical exposures, environmental toxins, environmental racism, and ecological destruction – all of which negatively impact the health and well-being of fenceline communities.
Just Moms STL
Just Moms STL is working to bring awareness to the radioactive material that is interspersed throughout the St. Louis metropolitan area and areas that have been deeply affected by these materials.
Waḳaƞ Ṭípi Awanyankapi
Waḳaƞ Ṭípi Awanyankapi is engaging people to honor and care for our natural places and the sacred sites and cultural value within them.
Owámniyomni Okhódayapi
Owámniyomni Okhódayapi aims to restore Dakota culture and environment at Bdote, where the Mississippi and Minnesota Rivers meet.
Little Earth Residents Association (LERA)
Little Earth is the only Indigenous preference project-based Section 8 rental assistance community in the United States, and has become a model for organizing on environmental and social justice issues, as well as a model of self-determination for all Native peoples.
Giniw Collective
GC provides Indigenous womxn, two-spirit-led frontlines resistance to protect our Mother, live in balance, and be our values.
Frogtown Neighborhood Association
FNA works through accountable collaboration, strategic partnerships, neighbor relationships and shared values to ensure the balance and harmony of our neighborhood by focusing on health, the physical environment, arts centered organizing and community wealth building.
Dream of Wild Health
Dream of Wild Health aims to restore health and well-being in the Native community by recovering knowledge of and access to healthy Indigenous foods, medicines, and lifeways.
Comunidades Organizando el Poder y la Acción Latina (COPAL)
COPAL is a member-based organization established in 2018 to improve the quality of life of Latine families.
Community Members for Environmental Justice
CMEJ is a coalition committed to healing multiple environmental harms in pollution-burdened neighborhoods of the Twin Cities with a focus on North Minneapolis.
Advancement of Hmong Americans
AHAMN empowers the Hmong community to be experts of their own lives through community engagement, knowledge sharing, and self-determination.
League of United Latin American Citizens - Iowa
LULAC is a Hispanic civil rights organization that aims to empower its members to create and develop opportunities where they are needed most.
Ujima STL
Ujima cultivates community through food justice, environmental stewardship, and youth empowerment.
Rustic Roots Sanctuary
RRS envisions a world where every community is nourished, mind, body, and spirit through equitable access to fresh, locally grown food, regenerative land stewardship, and holistic healing.
Rise4EJ
Rise4EJ aims to bring attention to the community-led solutions that are growing in resistance to chemical exposures, environmental toxins, environmental racism, and ecological destruction – all of which negatively impact the health and well-being of fenceline communities.
Just Moms STL
Just Moms STL is working to bring awareness to the radioactive material that is interspersed throughout the St. Louis metropolitan area and areas that have been deeply affected by these materials.
Centreville Citizens for Change
CCC is an all-volunteer community group dedicated to improving life for its underserved neighbors – 96% of whom are Black and 50% living in poverty – for a future free from the daily threat of flooding and sewage.
Agriculture for Community Restoration Economic Justice & Sustainability (ACRES)
ACRES aims to create a culture that elevates Black Farmers and Black Communities organizing towards self-determination over their food system and built environment.
A red Circle
A Red Circle builds community in North County through food sovereignty, education, and art.
We The People of Detroit
We the People of Detroit is dedicated to community coalition building and to the provision of resources that inform, train and mobilize the citizens of Detroit and beyond to improve their quality of life.
Wisconsin Green Muslims
WGM aims to educate the Muslim community and the public about Islamic EJ teachings, to apply these teachings in daily life, and to contribute to coalitions and collaborations working toward a just, healthy, peaceful and sustainable future.
Victory Garden Initiative, Inc.
Victory Garden aims to build communities that grow their own food in order to create a community-led, socially just, environmentally sustainable and nutritious food system for all.
Skaˀnikú·lat, Inc.
Skaˀnikú·lat’s mission is to reclaim the cultural value of “one mind” in the Oneida community through ancestral language and cultural enrichment in effort to restore holistic wellness for the next seven generations.
Milwaukee Water Commons
MWC is a cross-city network that fosters connection, collaboration and broad community leadership on behalf of our common waters.
Urban Native Collective
UNC exists to preserve and represent the culture and heritage of Native American, Indigenous, and First Nations people; to provide education, advocacy, and support on Indigenous issues and cultivate knowledge about Native American history in local and regional communities.
Junction Coalition of Toledo OH
The JC is a nonprofit community organization based in the Junction neighborhood of Toledo, OH, to empower residents and improve quality of life in a historically disinvested area of the city.
Environmental Health Watch
EHW aims to create healthy, regenerative communities by justly enriching environments and respecting the value of people and place.
Citizens' Resistance at Fermi Two
CRAFT intergenerational, multi-racial, cross-cultural team of concerned people committed to halting nuclear destruction and promoting renewable energy.
Southeast Environmental Task Force
SETF is dedicated to serving the southeast side and south suburbs of Chicago by promoting environmental education, pollution prevention, and sustainable development.
People for Community Recovery
PCR aims to to enhance the quality of life of residents living in communities affected by environmental pollution through access to environmental and climate justice, safe and affordable housing, economic equity, and community health.
Neighbors for Environmental Justice
N4EJ aims is to educate, advocate and organize with our community to accomplish environmental justice on the southwest side of Chicago.
Little Village Environmental Justice Organization
LVEJO aims to organize with our community to accomplish environmental justice in Little Village and achieve the self-determination of immigrant, low-income, and working-class families.
Getting Grown Collective
GGC equips Black and Brown communities in the Chicago area with tools to develop self-sustaining knowledge by supporting community-driven agriculture projects, collaborating with food and environmental policy makers, activating multigenerational engagement with agriculture, and providing alternative access to health professionals and healthy lifestyle options.
East Michigan Environmental Action Council
EMEAC’s intention is to create a just environment that affirms the humanity and dignity of everyone, as we work to build unity among grassroots justice organizations.
Just Moms STL
Just Moms STL is working to bring awareness to the radioactive material that is interspersed throughout the St. Louis metropolitan area and areas that have been deeply affected by these materials.
Pilsen Environmental Rights and Reform Organization (PERRO)
PERRO aims to spread awareness about the concept of environmental justice and make Pilsen a healthier place to live, work, and raise children.
Citizens' Resistance at Fermi Two
CRAFT intergenerational, multi-racial, cross-cultural team of concerned people committed to halting nuclear destruction and promoting renewable energy.
Chicago Asian Americans for Environmental Justice
CAAEJ comprises progressive Asian Americans in the greater Chicagoland area working to provide an Asian-American voice in the environmental movement and center the people impacted by environmental injustice.
Centreville Citizens for Change
CCC is an all-volunteer community group dedicated to improving life for its underserved neighbors – 96% of whom are Black and 50% living in poverty – for a future free from the daily threat of flooding and sewage.
Calumet Collaborative
The Calumet Collaborative catalyzes innovative partnerships between Illinois and Indiana community, government, business and nonprofit stakeholders to advance a thriving Calumet region through sustainable development.
Blacks in Green
BIG works to increase the rate at which neighbor-owned businesses are created and sustained; to build the capacity of neighbors to own, develop, and manage the property in their community; and to remember and reinvent the conservation lifestyle.
Wisdom Institute
Wisdom Institute is dedicated to empowering African American Women and girls through advocacy, education, and spirit centered healing.
Wisconsin Green Muslims
WGM aims to educate the Muslim community and the public about Islamic EJ teachings, to apply these teachings in daily life, and to contribute to coalitions and collaborations working toward a just, healthy, peaceful and sustainable future.
We Want Green Too
We Want Green Too aims to help Veterans create and sustain a healthy and suitable lifestyle when returning home from war.
We The People of Detroit
We the People of Detroit is dedicated to community coalition building and to the provision of resources that inform, train and mobilize the citizens of Detroit and beyond to improve their quality of life.
The Green Door Initiative
GDI aims to ensure that everyone is environmentally literate, capable of promoting and living out a sustainable lifestyle regardless of race, income, and zip code.
Soulardarity
Soulardarity is building a brighter future in Highland Park with education, organizing, and people-powered clean energy.
Tri-City CDC / Eden Park Project
Tri-City CDC is building upon existing natural, human, and financial assets in the Southwest Detr community to make the Eden Park Community Project a reality.
Petty Propolis, Inc.
Petty Propolis aims to leverage poetry, literary and literacy workshops, anti-racism facilitation, political education and community-centered initiatives in the service of a more just, livable and humane society.
Original United Citizens of Southwest Detroit
OUCSD is committed to improving the environment and quality of life in Southwest Detroit and its surrounding area.
Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition
A Red Circle builds community in North County through food sovereignty, education, and art.
East Michigan Environmental Action Council
EMEAC’s intention is to create a just environment that affirms the humanity and dignity of everyone, as we work to build unity among grassroots justice organizations.
Detroit Black Community Food Sovereignty Network
DBCFSN works to build self-reliance, advocate for food security and justice in Detroit’s Black community, engaging in urban agriculture, promoting healthy eating, encouraging cooperative buying, and directing youth toward careers in food-related fields.
Citizens' Resistance at Fermi Two
CRAFT intergenerational, multi-racial, cross-cultural team of concerned people committed to halting nuclear destruction and promoting renewable energy.
Black Autonomy Network Community Organization
Black Autonomy Network centers the overlapping identities of socioeconomic inequality, race, and education to promote an EJ approach to water accessibility in Benton Harbor.
Urban Native Collective
UNC exists to preserve and represent the culture and heritage of Native American, Indigenous, and First Nations people; to provide education, advocacy, and support on Indigenous issues and cultivate knowledge about Native American history in local and regional communities.
Calumet Collaborative
The Calumet Collaborative catalyzes innovative partnerships between Illinois and Indiana community, government, business and nonprofit stakeholders to advance a thriving Calumet region through sustainable development.
Just Transition Northwest Indiana
JTNWI is committed to educating and organizing Northwest Indiana communities and workers, giving voice to our shared stories, and supporting a just transition to a regenerative economy that protects the environment, climate, and future generations.
Map Legend: Our partners and their work
2025 MWEJN GRANTEE
2025 MWEJN Featured Grantee
Pollution and cumulative impacts
Food justice / sovereignty
Tribal sovereignty
Energy democracy & infrastructure
Water protection & drinking water
Just development
COPAL and community members attend the ICE Out of Minnesota March and Rally.
COPAL (Minnesota)
Comunidades Organizando el Poder y la Acción Latina
Since 2018, COPAL has served Latine communities in Minnesota, using grassroots powerbuilding to create a vibrant member-based organization that is now nearly 50,000 people strong. Members have long taken a holistic approach to improving life for Latine residents, but this mission has taken on new urgency with ICE raids on immigrant communities. Fortunately, COPAL was poised for action, with initiatives like the Immigrant Defense Network, a coalition of more than 100 labor, faith, and legal organizations, providing frontline aid to immigrants throughout Minnesota. Other grantees working in this space include the League of United Latin American Citizens in Iowa and Tamales y Bicicletas in Minnesota.
COPAL's efforts include work on pollution and cumulative impacts
Community members gather in Chicago, IL, for the Stop Poisoning Pilsen campaign organized by PERRO.
PERRO (Illinois)
Pilsen Environmental Rights and Reform Organization
The Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago has long been home to a vibrant, close-knit Mexican-American community, but it has also suffered from disproportionate environmental health harms. A truly resident-based organization, PERRO has been about neighbors helping neighbors to make Pilsen a safer, healthier place to call home since 2004. But with ICE targeting Chicago neighborhoods, PERRO has expanded its focus from fighting for clean air and water to helping residents fight against ICE’s occupation. Another community-based grantee fighting for just transition is Original United Citizens of Southwest Detroit in Michigan.
PERRO’s efforts include work on pollution, cumulative impacts, and clean water.
Community members attend a public meeting with a sign from Just Transition Northwest Indiana’s Community Over Big Tech campaign.
JTNWI (Indiana)
Just Transition Northwest Indiana
Indiana is known for cornfields and family farms, but the northern part of the state, along Lake Michigan, has long been an industrial area and sacrifice zone. Ensuring the just transition of this space to one rooted in a regenerative economy is JTNWI’s mission — and in recent days, that work has become more urgent as data center developers move quickly to take advantage of northwest Indiana’s industrial zoning. JTNWI has mobilized a rapid-defense “Community Over Big Tech” campaign to fight back against these new facilities that lower property values and drive up consumer costs while polluting air, land, and water. Other grantees working in this space include Soulardarity and People for Community Recovery in Illinois.
JTNWI’s efforts include work on energy democracy and infrastructure, pollution, cumulative impacts, and just development.
Young dancers at North Dakota Native Vote’s Stand and Vote concert.
NDNV (North Dakota)
North Dakota Native Vote
North Dakota Native Vote has been advocating for Native representation, enfranchisement, and self determination since 2018, when a voter-suppression bill threatened to stifle Native voices. Since then, NDNV has been building a voting bloc to uphold the sovereignty and representation of Native communities at all levels of government, from county to federal, to ensure they have a say in the decisions that affect Native rights, health, and safety. Key programs safeguard fair districting; help tribal members register to vote, learn about issues, and access polling stations; work with Rural Electric Cooperatives to impact governance and decision making; and develop protocols for data management, voter tracking, and election analysis. Other grantees working on Tribal sovereignty and cultural reclamation include Bad River Band of the Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa Indians in Wisconsin and Owámniyomni Okhódayapi in Minnesota.
NDNV’s efforts include work on Tribal sovereignty, energy democracy, pollution, and cumulative impacts.
Karen Nickel and Dawn Chapman, Co-Founders of Just Moms STL.
Missouri
Just Moms STL
The story of Just Moms STL is a story of the power of mothers and neighbors banding together against overwhelming odds. In 2012, two moms investigated strong odors from a fire at the West Lake Landfill in St. Louis, MO, and discovered that radioactive waste and other toxic materials from a uranium plant used for the Manhattan Project were present on a floodplain just 1,000 feet away from the landfill fire. In the past year, Just Moms STL scored a major victory, expanding eligibility under the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act to include 21 Missouri zip codes—winning over $8 million for affected residents. Other organizations fighting against toxic pollution include Community Members for Environmental Justice in Minneapolis and Black Hills Clean Water Alliance in South Dakota.
Just Moms STL’s efforts include work on clean water, pollution, and cumulative impacts.
Monica Lewis-Patrick, CEO of WPD speaks out against Detroit’s water shutoffs at a Water Is A Human Right protest in 2014.
WPD (Michigan)
We The People of Detroit
Access to drinking water is a necessity, but in Detroit, residents have for years contended with water shutoffs, skyrocketing rates, and a public health epidemic prompted by unsafe water supplies. We The People of Detroit has created a strong network of community volunteers who have expanded their scope from organizing for equitable, affordable clean water access to holistically addressing quality of life for Detroit residents using data-informed advocacy. In the past year, We the People of Detroit has teamed with Detroit vs. Everybody to launch the Water for Everybody campaign to drive awareness and advocacy. Other grantees working on clean water access include The Junction Coalition in Ohio, Milwaukee Water Commons in Wisconsin, and Flint Rising in Michigan.
WPD’s efforts include work on clean water.
Ujima STL urban farm project at George Washington Carver Farms.
Missouri
Ujima STL
Ujima STL is a mutual-aid organization serving greater St. Louis, an area that has been impacted by decades of food apartheid, environmental racism, and unemployment. Through outdoor education, teen mental health training, cleanups and tree plantings, and distribution of food and supplies, Ujima provides vital community support. A perfect example of neighbors helping neighbors, Ujima STL teamed with Action STL and others to raise money, organize volunteers, and provide direct aid for those affected by last spring’s tornado. Other grantees working on just development and food sovereignty include Rustic Roots Sanctuary in Missouri and Dream of Wild Health of Minnesota.
Ujima STL’s efforts include work on food justice, food sovereignty, and just development.
The future of power is place. Now’s the time to reinvest.
2025 proved that national change can be won at the local and regional level. At a moment when major philanthropies withdrew and federal power was weaponized against us, our grantee partners showed that it’s our unwavering commitment to home and one another that makes us unstoppable. As a mover of resources, the Midwest Environmental Justice Network has built that commitment into the very blueprint of our work for 2026 and beyond. Reinvest Midwest is our promise to invite increased philanthropic support and activate our region’s potential with new forms of capital and capacity. It’s our call to you to help us renew a movement that uplifts us all.
THANK YOU
2025 Grantee Partners
Advancement of Hmong Americans ●●●●●
Agriculture for Community Restoration Economic Justice & Sustainability ●●
Black Autonomy Network Community Organization ●
Black Hills Clean Water Alliance ●●
Blacks in Green ●●●●●
Centreville Citizens for Change ●●●
Cheyenne River Youth Project ●
Chicago Asian Americans for Environmental Justice ●
Citizens’ Resistance at Fermi Two ●●●
Community Members for Environmental Justice ●●
Comunidades Organizando el Poder y la Acción Latina ●
Detroit Black Community Food Sovereignty Network ●●
East Michigan Environmental Action Council ●●●●
Environmental Health Watch ●●●●
Frogtown Neighborhood Association ●●
Great Plains Tribal Water Alliance ●●
Junction Coalition of Toledo OH ●●
Little Earth Residents Association ●●
Little Village Environmental Justice Organization ●●●●●
Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition ●●●
Neighbors for Environmental Justice ●●
Original United Citizens of Southwest Detroit ●
People for Community Recovery ●●
Pilsen Environmental Rights and Reform Organization ●●
Rise4EJ ●●
Rosebud Energy Service Company ●●●●
Southeast Environmental Task Force ●●
Soulardarity ●●
Tri-City CDC/Eden Park Project ●●
Ujima STL ●●
ISSUE AREAS
Pollution and cumulative impacts
Food justice / sovereignty
Tribal sovereignty
Energy democracy & infrastructure
Water protection & drinking water
Just development
Leadership team
Kim Wasserman, 2025-26 Leadership Team Chair
Kim Foreman, Environmental Health Watch 2026 Leadership Team, 2025 Advisory Circle member
Carolina Ortiz, Comunidades Organizando el Poder y la Acción Latina 2026 Leadership Team, 2025 Advisory Circle member
Nicole Donaghy, North Dakota Native Vote 2026 Leadership Team, 2025 Advisory Circle member
Gloria Lowe, We Want Green Too 2026 Leadership Team, 2025 Advisory Circle member
Debra Taylor, We The People of Detroit 2025 Leadership Team
Brenda Coley, Milwaukee Water Commons 2025 Leadership Team
Roxxanne O’Brien, Community Members for Environmental Justice 2025 Leadership Team
Staff
Eartha Borer-Bell, Co-Executive Director
Shalini Gupta, Co-Executive Director
Gabriel Jones, Resource Mobilization Director
Anthena Gore, Program Director – Urban Outreach, Thriving Communities Grantmaking Program
Phoebe Young, Programs and Communications Manager
Devika Ghai, Midwest Frontline Fund Facilitator
Sofia Ledeneva, 2024-26 Tishman Catalyst Fellow
Julia Peters, 2026-27 Tishman Catalyst Fellow
OUr Advisory Circles
Cicely Allen, Wisdom Institute, 2026 Advisory Circle
Alicia Renee Farris, Tri-City CDC, 2026 Advisory Circle
Tara Houska, Giniw Collective, 2026 Advisory Circle
Rosa King, Skaˀnikú·lat, 2026 Advisory Circle
Monica Lewis-Patrick, We The People of Detroit, 2026 Advisory Circle
Maggie Lorenz, Waḳaƞ Ṭípi Awanyankapi, 2026 and 2025 Advisory Circles
Briana Mazzolini-Blanchard, Urban Native Collective, 2026 Advisory Circle
Taryn Randle, Getting Grown Collective, 2026 Advisory Circle
Alfredo Romo, Neighbors for Environmental Justice, 2026 Advisory Circle
Nick Speed, Ujima STL, 2026 Advisory Circle
Alicia Smith, The Junction Coalition, 2026 Advisory Circle
Ashley Williams, Just Transition Northwest Indiana, 2026 and 2025 Advisory Circles
Huda Alkaff, Wisconsin Green Muslims and Michigan Green Muslims, 2025 Advisory Circle
Beto Lugo-Martinez, Rise4EJ, 2025 Advisory Circle
Cheryl Johnson, People for Community Recovery, 2025 Advisory Circle
Nayyirah Shariff, Flint Rising, 2025 Advisory Circle
Sikowis Nobiss, Great Plains Action Society, 2025 Advisory Circle
2025 foundation partners
Argosy Foundation
Builders Initiative
Comer Family Foundation
Crown Family Philanthropies
Franciscan Sisters of Mary
The Joyce Foundation
The Minneapolis Foundation
McKnight Foundation
Mosaic Environmental Fund
Mott Foundation